


Restaurant Wars

by SuburbanSun



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Restaurant, F/M, Flirting, Meet-Cute, Non-SHIELD AU, Waiters & Waitresses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-05-27
Updated: 2016-05-27
Packaged: 2018-07-10 11:48:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,997
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6983710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SuburbanSun/pseuds/SuburbanSun
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I need you to pretend you’re my ex-boyfriend to break up my date,” she said in a rush.</p>
<p>Well, he thought. That was a first.</p>
<p>(Fitzsimmons + "You’re my waiter and I’m on a really crappy date with an asshole" AU)</p>
            </blockquote>





	Restaurant Wars

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Aretsuna](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Aretsuna/gifts).



> aretsuna on tumblr asked for Fitzsimmons + "You’re my waiter and I’m on a really crappy date with an asshole AU." Thanks for the prompt!

“Thanks for choosing Alphonso’s. Can I start you two off with something to drink?” Fitz did his best to summon a smile as he greeted what would hopefully be his last table of the night. Working an open-to-close double had him dead on his feet, and all he wanted in life was a hot shower and his warm bed.

“I think we need a few more minutes,” said the man at the table, flipping the menu over.

“No, no, I think we’re ready,” said the woman across from him. She looked up at Fitz with a tight smile and pleading eyes. “I’ll just have a water. And I can go ahead and order my entree now, if you’re ready.”

_Maybe this night will be over sooner than I thought._ Fitz nodded for her to go on, but her date interrupted her.

“Jemma, you sure you don’t want booze or something? I told you, it's on me.”

The woman-- _Jemma_ \-- wrinkled her nose (seemingly involuntarily) before recovering. “Thank you, but no. It’s just so important to stay hydrated!”

“I can come back with your waters and give you time to look over the menu,” Fitz offered. The man shrugged, and though Jemma looked at him with wide eyes, he turned and made for the kitchen anyway. _Odd bird, that one._

He checked on another table, rang in a dessert order and filled a pair of glasses with water in no time, and when he arrived at table 19 once again, the tension was palpable.

“I didn’t say it like that.”

“You did, actually, but it’s fine.” Jemma crossed her arms and sat back in her chair.

“I didn’t!”

“It’s quite alright.”

“Hey man,” he said, turning his attention to Fitz. “How do you say this?” He pointed at a word on the menu, and Fitz smiled politely.

“Prosciutto.”

“Is that not what I said?”

Jemma chuckled a bit derisively, and Fitz decided he’d hate to be on the losing side of a date with her. “No, it’s not.”

“Um, should I give you a few more minutes?”

“No!” Jemma said, holding out her menu. “I’ll have the linguini with a Caesar salad, and you can bring them both at the same time.”

“Babe, you don’t want any starters?” The man rapped his knuckles twice against his paper menu on the table. “They’ve got a lot of things stuffed with other things.”

Her smile was sharp as the edge of a chef’s knife. “No.”

“Alllllright… I’ll uh, put that in for you. And what about for you, sir?”

“Hmm. Lasagna any good here?”

“It is, sir, though I should note that as the menu says, it will take an additional 20 minutes--”

“--which is simply too long,” interjected Jemma. “Didn’t you say you were starving?”

The man rubbed his stomach thoughtfully. “That’s true. How about good ol’ spaghetti and meatballs?”

Fitz jotted the order down with a nod, then tucked their menus under one arm. “I’ll have that out to you shortly.”

After putting in their orders, he spent several minutes getting a head start on his sidework in the kitchen. He’d rolled at least 20 sets of silverware when he heard a loud, urgent, “ _Psssst.”_

Startled, he looked up to see Jemma hovering awkwardly just outside the entrance to the kitchen, in the hallway that led to the restroom, and beyond that, to the alley behind the building.

He set down the napkin in his hand and walked over to her. “Can I help you with something?”

“I’m so sorry to interrupt,” she began, her expression genuine.

Fitz laughed. “It's fine. Rolling silver isn’t exactly my favorite pastime.”

She smiled, and for the first time, it occurred to him how utterly gorgeous she was. She seemed much less terrifying, too, away from her date. “I have a favor to ask of you, and you can certainly say no if it makes you feel uncomfortable.”

He raised his eyebrows at her. “What’s that?”

“I need you to pretend you’re my ex-boyfriend to break up my date,” she said in a rush.

Well. That was a first.

“I know how absurd that sounds,” she said, wringing her hands in front of her. Fitz leaned his shoulder against the tile wall, reaching up to scratch at his jaw, a nervous habit. “But my cell phone died earlier this evening-- this is _not_ the first stop on tonight’s terrible date, unfortunately-- so I can’t pretend someone’s calling me. And I just can’t think of anything else that would be extreme enough to extricate me from the situation.”

Fitz nodded slowly, taking it all in. “Have you tried just… leaving? Or telling him off for whatever he's doing wrong?”

“I've thought of that, obviously. His father is a colleague of my father. That’s how this whole ordeal began-- it was a setup.”

“And if you blow him off--”

“--my family will be none too pleased. I'll never hear the end of it.”

Fitz screwed up his mouth and stroked his chin, considering. “Is he that bad?”

Jemma chuckled darkly. “If you like boorish men with nothing of interest to say, then certainly not. But I’ve barely gotten a word in edgewise, and believe me, nothing he’s had to tell me was worth the breath it took.”

“That sounds a bit extreme.”

She gave him a withering look. “Five minutes into the first part of our date, he'd already questioned the premise of my doctoral research, because, and I quote, 'science is just a bunch of guesses, anyway.'"

Fitz widened his eyes. “That _is_ bad.”

“Exactly,” she said.

“Well… what do you need me to do?”

She peeked nervously down the hallway. They couldn’t quite make out table 19 from their vantage point, but Fitz knew that her date could come looking for her any moment, so he made a quick decision and reached out for her elbow, gently guiding her into the kitchen. It was late, and most everyone besides Mack, the chef, was already gone.

Once they were safely hidden away from the viewpoint of any passersby, Jemma filled him in on her plan. He nodded along, taking down notes on his order pad at a few key parts, until he felt like they could pull it off-- at least, he hoped they could.

A few short minutes later, Jemma had already sat back down at her table as Fitz approached with her salad. He took a deep breath before setting it down in front of her with a thud. It was, apparently, showtime.

“I thought this would come out with my meal,” Jemma said coolly. Fitz wasn’t sure if she was adopting the persona they’d agreed on, or if that was merely the demeanor her date brought out in her.

“Well, _I_ thought the things we said to each other meant something, _Jemma._ ” The way he spat out her name felt like overkill to him, but the twinkle in her eye said otherwise. “I suppose I thought a lot of things that turned out to be untrue.”

“Jem… what’s going on?” asked the date, looking back and forth between Jemma and Fitz. “Do you two know each other?”

“Just ignore him. I had hoped we could put this behind us, Leo.”

Fitz cringed. She had said that calling him ‘Fitz’ didn’t sell the lie quite as well as his given name, but he didn’t have to like it. No matter; it helped him stay in character. “Well, we can’t.”

Jemma tucked her hair behind her ear, giving her date an awkward half-smile, as if she were simply embarrassed to be confronted like this in public. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know he’d be working. If I’d known, I would have insisted we go somewhere else.”

“Oh, just like you _insisted_ we’d be together forever? Or like you _insisted_ I was the only one for you? Or maybe how you _insisted_ I get this tattoo of your name right over my heart?” Fitz pressed a hand to his chest, ignoring Jemma’s slight frown at his improvisation.

“You _chose_ \--”

“Hey, guy,” began the date. “I think maybe it’s time for you to leave.”

“I work here. She should be the one to leave.”

“I shouldn’t have to!” Jemma sounded indignant, but Fitz could see through her with no trouble at all. The light in her eyes and the hint of a smile on her face gave her away, and he hoped her date wasn’t as observant. “Our relationship is in the past.”

“Is it?” Fitz dug into his apron pocket and fished out his cell phone, pulling up his text message app and scrolling quickly. “Then why do I have dozens and dozens of texts from you asking for me back?” It was a risky move, but surely he’d scrolled so quickly that the date couldn’t make out that most of the texts were from “Mack,” “Hunter,” and “Mum,” rather than “Jemma.”

Jemma blinked up at him, then heaved a sigh. “Fine. Maybe you’re right. But that’s all over now.”

“Is it?” Fitz said softly, and they locked eyes for a long moment. He swallowed, then opened his mouth to say something else, one of the actual lines he’d written down, perhaps, but before he could, Jemma’s date spoke up.

“Sure doesn’t seem like it,” he said, pushing his chair back from the table with a loud screech. He reached in his pocket for his wallet and tossed a few small bills on the table, then held up both hands, palms out. “I can’t handle this kind of drama, Jemma. It’s not my thing. Maybe they don’t teach you good manners at that fancy school of yours.” He shook his head at both of them, then headed for the exit.

Fitz and Jemma watched his back until it disappeared behind the double doors, and then sighed with simultaneous relief. A slow smile forming on his face, Fitz let himself fall into the chair her date had abandoned.

“We did it,” he said.

“We did.” She smiled at him fully, her nose crinkling, and after a moment, held out her fist over the table. He laughed, then bumped it with his own.

“You were quite good,” he told her, idly and instinctively straightening the sugar packets in the caddy on the table.

She shook her head, looking down to hide a smile. “No, I almost gave the game away! You, though! You were magnificent! Though I’ll admit, you frightened me a bit with all your improvisation.”

He shrugged, grinning. “It worked, didn’t it?”

“It did.”

Silence settled over them, and Fitz noticed the rest of the dining room had completely cleared out. It was almost closing time, after all. “Well-- I can go check on your food, if you’d still like it. I’m sure you’re eager to get out of here.”

“Actually--” She looked up again, catching his eye. “I _would_ still like that linguini, if you don’t mind. I suppose acting works up quite an appetite.” He chuckled. “And-- and I think I ought to buy you a drink, at the very least, as repayment. You really helped me out tonight.”

“Oh, you don’t have to do that.”

“But I’d like to-- _Leo_.”

Fitz groaned. “Okay, okay, as long as you agree to never call me that again.”

“I’ll promise no such thing!” Her smile was mischievous, and the sight of it made his heart speed up. “But maybe I can agree that it’s off limits-- if only for tonight. It’s the least I can do for my hero.”

Briefly, Fitz thought back to the beginning of the night, when he’d just wanted to get home and go to bed. And now, just a few hours later, he was sitting in a candlelit dining room, flirting and being flirted with by someone whose smile made everything seem a little bit brighter.

A good night’s sleep, his still-incomplete sidework, and the entirety of the outside world were suddenly the furthest things from Fitz’s mind.

**Author's Note:**

> Want to hang out on tumblr? I'm unbreakablejemmasimmons over there!


End file.
